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Breeding improved brewer's yeast – and brewing quality beer

The biodiversity of yeast is an incredibly powerful force capable of not only profoundly shaping the utility of yeast, but also is the foundation of a global beer industry estimated by Canadean at more than US $700 billion.

Indeed, some 450 years ago, a wild yeast strain growing on a beech tree in Patagonia somehow found its way into a cold fermentation tank in Bavaria, ultimately becoming what we now know as lager yeast.